@Alan Levine “it seems most of the example open courses are courses *about* open courses or edtech. I’m curious where the ones about history, art, math are”…

and
“people doing this for official credit are going to have the extrinsic carrot motivation to be active”…

I was recently enrolled in a 2 week course taught by Dave, and I had the same thoughts. Since completing the course, I have been considering the different ways I can incorporate openness into the subject I teach, (Video Game Art & Design).

Unlike other areas of artistic expression, there are very few “published” teaching resources I can use in my classes. By that I mean things like software, DVDs and books. Dave’s course showed me that I ought to be using technology to go directly to my contacts in the games industry rather than waiting for one of them to write a book.

I’ve also observed some of my students entering the workforce without the necessary social skills for professional communication in the digital age. Openness might be the carrot on the stick that helps them fix this.

For me, the benefits of openness are to expose my students to resources that aren’t accessible through last-century channels, and to encourage them to join the community which they hope will eventually employ them as graduates.